


assistance

by patrokla



Series: means and methods [3]
Category: The Magicians (TV)
Genre: Hopeful Ending, Implied/Referenced Dubious Consent, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, M/M, Other, Panic Attacks, Tenderness, Trauma, Unreliable Narrator, Very Unfun Hospital Conversations, and despite all of this:, what might kindly be described as
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-15
Updated: 2019-06-15
Packaged: 2020-05-12 10:17:10
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,093
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19227136
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/patrokla/pseuds/patrokla
Summary: “You should be in bed,” he says, voice a little uneven, throat sore, and Eliot shakes his head helplessly and looks up at the ceiling for a moment.“In a minute,” Eliot tells him. “You have to do something for me, first.”Anything. He did anything. He might even do it again, if he had to.or: Quentin is alive. Eliot is helpful.





	assistance

**Author's Note:**

> To celebrate finishing my first year of grad school, I slept for five hours and then wrote this. 
> 
> It's the third and final part in a series, and definitely needs the context of the other works. 
> 
> Warnings: non-graphic but extensive discussions of extremely dubiously consensual sexual encounters between Quentin and the Monster (I've tagged for that and non-con because it's borderline at best), panic attacks, unintentional self-harm. This is a heavy one, folks. I'm serious about that hopeful ending, though.
> 
>  
> 
> [tumblr](https://leguin.tumblr.com)  
> [dreamwidth](https://patrokla.dreamwidth.org/)

  
_“Something happened with the Monster.”_  
  
He can’t look at Eliot’s face. He can’t. He lets the words fall out of his mouth and sits in the uncomfortable chair by Eliot’s bed, and he looks everywhere else. The sheet twisted over Eliot’s legs. The familiarly ugly pattern of the infirmary linoleum - that white tile with bursts of black and gray that is ubiquitous in hospitals, it seems, regardless of how magical they are.  
  
He watches Eliot’s hands tighten in the sheet. Clench, knuckles turning white. Slow and deliberate release. He knows those hands, intimately. His body knows them too.  
  
The room where Eliot’s been taken to recover is a small, private one, away from the noise and bustle of the infirmary itself. Not for the first time, Quentin wishes there was some kind of distraction. Something to distract him, something to distract from him, anything. A bomb. A well-timed ‘get well soon’ stripper. Is that a thing? Margo could probably make that a thing.  
  
The Monster touches his shoulder, more gently and briefly than it ever has before. He looks up, eyes half-focused. Deliberate movements, meant to pacify or appease. He doesn’t want to make eye contact, he never does, but he has to look, because if he doesn’t -  
  
Eliot is looking back at him. Right.  
  
“Q,” Eliot is saying, and Quentin looks at the bridge of his nose out of habit.  
  
“Q, baby, can you please tell me what you mean?”  
  
Right. He hadn’t actually - he’d thought maybe this would be enough. He realizes, abruptly, that he’s opened a can of worms expecting all the worms to escape. But opening it isn’t enough, is it? Only the ones at the very top are going to writhe, blindly, out of the can. The rest will need. Assistance.  
  
He can do that.  
  
He can do that.  
  
He can do that, he can do things, he’s capable of so little, but this, at least, is right in his wheelhouse. He _breaks_ things, so why can’t he  
  
open his mouth, and explain. Open mouth. Words, no words. It doesn’t matter. He’s feeling, hm, he’s feeling nothing at all. Floating in zero-g, separate from the rest of the world. No connections, no tethers. Give him a push and he’ll tumble away endlessly. In a way, it’s natural.  
  
“Quentin!”  
  
The word is loud, in his ear. That’s a name. That’s his name. Don’t wear it out.  
  
_Right_ in his ear. He - his eyes are closed. He opens them, and they feel. He feels -  
  
Eliot is no longer in the bed. He’s kneeling on the linoleum, a few inches away, a few inches below.  
  
“Just focus on my voice, Q,” he says, low and urgent. “Take a breath.”  
  
He doesn’t want to open his mouth. Breathes in quick, through his nose, and realizes, suddenly, that he’s crying. His face feels hot, wet, twisted up with something. Raw. He opens his mouth and a gasping sob tears its way out immediately. The sound is loud in the silence, but Eliot is still looking up at him, hasn’t moved away.  
  
“That’s good, Q, that’s good. Take another breath, deep breath -“  
  
Deep breath. He sucks in air.  
  
“Now hold it, and count with me in your head. Just three seconds, one, two, three, exhale. Good job, baby, let’s do that again, okay?”  
  
They had done that, a lot, over the decades. The decades weren’t real, but Eliot still, he still remembers, clearly. How to calm Quentin down from a panic attack.  
  
They do it again, and again, and gradually he becomes aware of more than the tiniest sliver of himself, the corner of Eliot’s face.  
  
“You should be in bed,” he says, voice a little uneven, throat sore, and Eliot shakes his head helplessly and looks up at the ceiling for a moment.  
  
“In a minute,” Eliot tells him. “You have to do something for me, first.”  
  
Anything. He did anything. He might even do it again. If he had to.  
  
“I don’t _want_ to,” he says quietly. “I didn’t want to, I just didn’t know what else to do. There was nobody else. It was just me and him, for - so long.”  
  
“You and the - the Monster,” Eliot says. An unnecessary clarification. There has never been anyone else.  
  
“Yes,” Quentin says, almost whispering. “Me and the Monster.”  
  
He meets Eliot’s eyes then, finally, thinks maybe this is it, maybe _this_ is enough.  
  
Eliot looks back. His face is drawn with pain, he really shouldn’t be out of bed, shouldn’t be on the floor in front of Quentin, for Quentin.  
  
“Q, I love you,” Eliot says softly. “No matter what you did, no matter what you had to do, no matter what the Monster did to you. You survived it, and you made it to me. You don’t have to tell me if you’re not ready, but can you just - can you open your hands, baby, please?”  
  
His hands?  
  
He looks down at them, and sees that they’re clenched into fists, knuckles sticking out jaggedly. He uncurls his fingers. His palms are littered with bloody, uneven crescents. Oh.  
  
“I didn’t realize,” he starts, looking at them dumbly.  
  
“It’s okay,” Eliot tells him, “It’s okay. I just don’t want you to hurt yourself.”  
  
Too late for that, he doesn’t say, just jerks his chin up at the hospital bed.  
  
“Your turn.”  
  
“Alright,” Eliot says, but he doesn’t get up right away. He reaches out both hands, very slowly, and clasps one of Quentin’s. It’s a loose embrace, their palms not touching, but Eliot strokes the skin of Quentin’s wrist with his fingers, careful and warm. Gentle. Something inside him begins to thaw.  
  
“I missed you,” he says to Eliot’s fingers, his hands, the bridge of his nose. His eyes. His mouth, which smiles unevenly.  
  
“I missed you too,” Eliot says to him. “So much.”  
  
Quentin has to help him get back into bed, and Eliot’s covered in sweat and taking pained breaths through his nose by the end of it. He won’t take the medication Lipson gave him for pain, says he doesn’t want to sleep yet, but he lets Quentin tut a spell that eases the worst of it. Afterwards, when the sheet is straight and he’s wiped the sweat from Eliot’s face, he curls up on the bed next to him.  
  
He rests his head on Eliot’s shoulder. Takes a deep breath. Thinks, not a controlled demolition this time. Just a door opening. He breathes in, breathes out, feels Eliot do the same. Proof of life.  
  
He tells him about the Monster.


End file.
